Mass-Producing the Individual: Mary C. Jarrett, Elmer E. Southard, and the Industrial Origins of Psychiatric Social Work

SUMMARY: This article examines the origins of psychiatric social work in the United States between 1912 and 1930. It argues that the establishment of the field needs to be understood in terms of Mary C. Jarrett and Elmer E. Southard's efforts to apply psychiatric techniques to the mental health problems of industrial employees. It further argues that Jarrett and Southard worked to develop a treatment approach to the mental health problems of industrial workers that they termed "individualization," and that despite their assumptions about the future of psychiatric social work the field was never established as an important part of industrial management.